TED-Ed
How Your Muscular System Works
Get ready for some heavy lifting! A detailed video lesson explains the different muscle groups and their functions. The presenter compares and contrasts different types of muscle compositions related to their purposes.
TED-Ed
The First Asteroid Ever Discovered
Flash back to 1801 to meet Ceres, the first asteroid discovery! Use a video lesson to learn how careful plotting and measuring led to the discovery of Ceres. Once lost, mapping the orbit led to new astronomy and new mathematics to...
Be Smart
Doomsday Machines
Nuclear weapons changed war forever. Scientists now know that a few of these weapons have the ability to change the climate and cause a mass extinction. Watch a video that details the ways these machines work—and the implications that...
Be Smart
How An Igloo Keeps You Warm
The idea of staying warm by surrounding yourself with ice confuses many—but it works! An informative video explains the science behind this as part of a larger playlist. It details the inspiration from animal shelters and how people make...
Be Smart
The Cheerios Effect
Why does cereal clump together in milk? Scientists answered this question in 2005 with the help of physics and math. A video explains the relationship between buoyancy, surface tension, and the meniscus. It teaches how to attract or...
Be Smart
Engines of Destruction: The Science of Hurricanes!
A typical tropical cyclone consumes the same amount of power as the entire United States. Scientists understand hurricanes and predict their sizes and paths. The video explains the relationship between hurricanes and ideal engines. It...
Be Smart
What’s Really Warming the Earth?
More carbon dioxide exists in the atmosphere than ever in human history. An informative video introduces the topic of global warming as part of a larger playlist. It looks at possible causes such as Earth's orbit, Earth's moving axis,...
PBS
The Trouble With Trilobites
Trilobites survived on Earth for longer than mammals have, so what was their secret? From their evolution to diversity, they survived multiple large changes in the environment—and even flourished. Then, in the matter of less than a...
PBS
When Did the First Flower Bloom?
Were the first flowers made in China? The first evidence of a flower, discovered in current-day China, changes the story of life on Earth. A short video details the evolution of flowers. It highlights the co-evolution of animals and...
PBS
What Colors Were Dinosaurs?
Beauty has no color, so why do scientists care about the color of dinosaurs? New evidence turned the world of dinosaurs colors upside down! From adorable red, fluffy dinosaurs to sharply contrasting black and white, these colors inform...
PBS
Stegosaurs: Tiny Brains and Thagomizers
In 1982, a Far Side comic referenced the thagomizer, and now thagomizer remains the appropriate term used by the Smithsonian, BBC, and scientists. An engaging video explains why stegosaurs are unique, focusing on the tiny brains,...
PBS
That Time Oxygen Almost Killed Everything
Oxygen keeps us alive, but did you ever consider how Earth found the right balance? Eons produced this video as part of a larger series that explores when Earth contained very little oxygen and green oceans ruled the planet. Viewers see...
PBS
Dimetrodon: Our Most Unlikely Ancestor
Dimetrodon lived before flowers, and people often believe it was a dinosaur. Research, however, proves a different story. An informative video teaches more about the dimetrodon, a mammal often confused for a reptile. It explains the...
PBS
The Extinction That Never Happened
How do scientists define a mass extinction event in the fossil record, and what happens when they are wrong? Scientists find living plants and animals previously believed to be extinct on almost every continent. An engaging video...
PBS
History's Most Powerful Plants
At one point, scale trees accounted for nearly half of the biomass in North America and Europe. An installment of a longer video series introduces these strange plants and describes their features, adaptations, and eventual demise. It...
PBS
When The Earth Was Purple
Earth appears blue and green now, but an interesting video covers a theory about when our planet was purple. We know the sun emits mostly green light, so why do most plants repel green light rather than absorbing it? Did purple microbes...
PBS
When Whales Walked
Remember that time whales were the size of house cats and walked on land? It's true—the evolution of whales is stranger than many suspect! See it all unfold in a historical video from PBS Eons channel that presents the evidence proving...
PBS
An Illustrated History of Dinosaurs
Science and art influence each other, and a visual study of dinosaurs based on artwork throughout time introduces an interesting topic. The video from the PBS Eons channel features Hank Green. It highlights artwork from the earliest...
Veritasium
Scientific Notation - Explained!
Scientists use very large and very small numbers when measuring things. A Veritasium video explains how scientific notation simplifies these numbers. It offers examples of how to convert such numbers into scientific notation—and from...
Veritasium
Atomic Theory
"I would rather have questions that can't be answered than answers that can't be questioned." - Richard Feynman. The video by Veritasium presents one of these questions, proposed by Feynman, along with his answer. It discusses the...
PBS
The Food Chain
How does the amount of water required to grow alfalfa impact ice cream prices? The PBS food science video, part of a larger playlist, explains how farmers use water to grow the alfalfa that is fed to dairy cows. the video introduces the...
PBS
Turning Food Waste Into a Resource
One in every seven truckloads of perishable foods delivered to grocery stores gets thrown away. Is there anything that can be done with this waste? One solution is to recycle the old produce and turn it into fertilizer. The video, part...
PBS
Food Is Fuel
Which has more calories, a cupcake or a rat? The odd question grabs pupils' attention as they learn about food as fuel in an intriguing installment of the PBS food science playlist. The video explains how scientists use a bomb...
PBS
The Sweet Science of Chocolate
Mesoamericans discovered the cocoa tree more than 2,000 years ago, and chocolate has been popular ever since. The PBS video, part of a series on food science, iexamines cocoa trees, the history of the uses of cocoa, and how people make...